An investigation of the role of scientific expertise in the climate change debate and its consequences for democratic governance.

1. Democracy
and
Expertise:
Lessons
from
the
Debate
over
Global
Warming
Whereas
the
role
of
the
technical
expert
in
democratic
decision-­‐making
was
formerly
seen
to
be
the
provision
of
disinterested
advice
for
use
in
policy
formulation,
their
capacity
in
this
regard
is
increasingly
under
question.
Many
argue
that
expertise
is
in
fact
vulnerable
to
politicization
for
self-­‐serving
ends,
due
in
part
to
the
unachievable
nature
of
objectivity,
and
hence
not
as
infallible
as
was
once
thought.
Science
is
now
often
viewed
as
‘politics
by
other
means’.1
As
a
result
technical
knowledge
is
increasingly
being
contested
in
the
public
sphere,
by
expert
and
lay
groups
alike.2
This
paper
will
address
the
extent
to
which
this
contestation
either
enhances
or
hinders
democratic
governance.
In
order
to
address
this
issue
I
will
be
investigating
the
debate
surrounding
anthropogenic
climate
change.
Despite
the
apparent
consensus
on
its
existence
and
human
causes,
this
issue,
and
the
adequacy
of
scientific
expertise
surrounding
it,
has
been
hotly
contested
in
recent
years.3
I
will
seek
to
analyse
the
nature
of
this
contestation,
its
implications
for
the
formulation
of
climate
change
policy,
and
for
the
conflict
between
expertise
and
democracy.
From
this
discussion,
I
will
suggest
ways
in
which
this
conflict
can
be
nullified.
Initially
though,
I
shall
begin
with
an
investigation
of
expertise
and
its
place
in
democracy.
Expertise
and
Democracy
The
use
of
scientific
expertise
in
democratic
decision-­‐making
has,
throughout
the
modern
period,
been
governed
by
the
ideal
of
neutrality.
Under
this
traditional
(Western)
model,
scientific
experts
are
presumed
detached
from
1
Bruno
Latour,
quoted
in
Mark
B.
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy:
Expertise,
Institutions,
and
Representation,
London,
MIT
Press,
2009,
p.
185.
2
Ibid,
pp.
2-­‐3.
3
Jacquelin
Burgess,
et
al.,
‘Global
Warming
in
the
Public
Sphere,’
Philosophical
Transactions:
Mathematical,
Physical
and
Engineering
Sciences,
Vol.
365,
No.
1860,
2007,
2751.
1

2. the
political,
social
and
cultural
processes
underlying
the
societies
which
they
inhabit
such
that
they
may
provide
objective
and
value
neutral
advice
to
political
representatives.
Consequently,
while
part
of
the
political
process,
experts
and
expert
advice
are
deemed
apolitical.4
The
authority
of
their
advice,
and
hence
their
legitimacy
within
the
democratic
system,
is
premised
on
the
supposed
attainability
of
scientific
certainty
through
the
use
of
the
scientific
method.5
This
image
of
the
expert
as
the
disinterested
and
authoritative
arbiter
has,
however,
been
challenged
since
the
mid
twentieth-­‐century
by
the
growing
awareness
of
limits
to
expert
knowledge,
and
the
perception
that
bias
and
special
interests
are
influencing
the
conduct
of
scientific
knowledge
generation.6
The
very
public
nature
of
contestation
and
controversy
in
scientific
discourse,
such
as
that
witnessed
during
the
global
warming
debate
is,
at
least
in
part,
responsible
for
this
reformulation.
For
rather
than
expertise
‘speaking
truth
to
power’,
scientific
experts
are
often
viewed
as
an
interest
group
like
any
other.7
It
is
indeed
the
case
that
research,
from
which
expert
knowledge
and
advice
is
generated,
is
to
a
large
degree
directed
by
government
and
commercial
funding.
Often
dependent
upon
external
sources
for
funding
streams,
expert
bodies
are
rarely
in
total
control
of
their
research
programs.8
For
example,
the
use
by
Western
governments
of
mechanisms
such
as
tax
credits
and
favourable
4
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy,
pp.
9-­‐10.
5
I
take
‘scientific
method’
to
indicate
inquiry
based
upon
the
gathering
of
empirical
data
and
testing
of
hypotheses,
both
through
the
use
of
reason
and
instrumental
rationality.
Raphael
Sassower,
Knowledge
without
Expertise:
On
the
Status
of
Scientists,
Albany,
State
University
of
New
York
Press,
1993,
p.
69.
6
Brian
Martin
and
Eveleen
Richards,
‘Scientific
Knowledge,
Controversy,
and
Public
Decision
Making,’
in
Sheila
Jasanoff
et
al.
(eds.),
Handbook
of
Science
and
Technology
Studies,
Thousand
Oaks,
SAGE
Publications,
1995,
pp.
506-­‐507.
7
Clark
A.
Miller,
‘Challenges
in
the
Application
of
Science
to
Global
Affairs:
Contingency,
Trust,
and
Moral
Order,’
in
Paul
N.
Edwards
and
Clark
A.
Miller
(eds.),
Changing
the
Atmosphere:
Expert
Knowledge
and
Environmental
Governance,
Cambridge,
MIT
Press,
2001,
p.
278.
For
an
example
of
this
line
of
argument
see
S.
A.
Boehmer-­‐Christiansen,
‘Britain
and
the
International
Panel
on
Climate
Change:
The
Impacts
of
Scientific
Advice
on
Global
Warming
Part
1:
Integrated
Policy
Analysis
and
the
Global
Dimension’,
Environmental
Politics,
Vol.
4,
No.
1,
1995,
pp.
15-­‐16.
8
Roy
Macleod,
‘Science
and
Democracy:
Historical
Reflections
on
Present
Discontents,’
Minerva,
Vol.
35,
1997,
p.
374.
2

3. patent
policies,
coupled
with
commercial
sector
funding
of
industrial
labs,
has
helped
guide
scientific
research
towards
profit-­‐orientated
applications.9
Experts,
moreover,
are
now
often
in
the
employ
of
governments,
advocacy
groups,
NGOs,
and
commercial
entities,
which
seek
to
use
the
authority
of
expertise
to
garner
support
for
their
particular
policy
goals.10
Such
activity
undermines
the
‘truth
to
power’
model,
and
its
assumption
of
a
linear
relationship
between
neutral
scientific
knowledge
and
its
subsequent
use
in
policy
formulation,
by
appearing
to
align
expertise
with
particular
interest
groups.11
This
realisation
of
the
political
usage
of
scientific
expertise
has
been
accompanied
by
an
appreciation
of
the
political
nature
of
scientific
knowledge
itself.
Instead
of
such
knowledge
being
seen
as
an
objective
representation
of
nature,
or
verifiable
truth,
it
is
now
widely
understood
to
involve
the
negotiated
outcome
of
interactions
between
experts
and
the
outside
world.12
These
interactions
are
necessarily
affected
by
social,
cultural,
and
political
concerns,
which
in
turn
influence
the
content
of
those
engagements.13
Manifested
in
the
laying
down
of
assumptions,
and
the
interpretation
of
uncertainties,
these
interactions
can
result
in
very
different
representations
of
nature,
in
what
is
ultimately
a
human
and
constrained
exercise.14
Nonetheless,
the
authority
granted
to
scientific
expertise
in
contemporary
democratic
decision-­‐making
continues
to
be
grounded
in
ideals
of
ethical
and
value
neutrality.15
Scientists
are
thus
expected
to
be
infallible,
removed
from
the
sphere
of
moral
or
political
9
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy,
pp.
10-­‐11.
10
Alan
Irwin,
Citizen
Science:
A
Study
of
People,
Expertise,
and
Sustainable
Development,
London,
Routledge,
1995,
p.
9.
11
Esther
Turnhout,
‘Heads
in
the
Clouds:
Knowledge
Democracy
as
a
Utopian
Dream,’
in
Roeland
J.
in
‘t
Veld
(ed.)
Knowledge
Democracy:
Consequences
for
Science,
Politics,
and
Media,
Heidelberg,
Springer,
2010,
pp.
25-­‐26.
12
Susan
E.
Cozzens
and
Edward
J.
Woodhouse,
‘Science,
Government,
and
the
Politics
of
Knowledge,’
in
Sheila
Jasanoff
et
al.
(eds.),
Handbook
of
Science
and
Technology
Studies,
Thousand
Oaks,
SAGE
Publications,
1995,
pp.
533-­‐534.
13
This
process
is
similar
in
operation
to
democratic
representation,
which
rather
than
being
a
mirror
for
the
pre-­‐existing
reality
of
popular
will,
is
a
negotiated
outcome
conducted
by
correspondence.
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy,
p.
5-­‐8.
14
Irwin,
Citizen
Science,
p.
49.
Brown
5-­‐7
15
Frank
Fischer,
Technocracy
and
the
Politics
of
Expertise,
Newbury
Park,
SAGE
Publications,
1990,
p.
146.
3

4. judgement.16
This
is
even
the
case
when
the
area
under
investigation
is
one
of
vital
human
interest,
as
it
is
with
the
threat
of
global
warming.
Unwilling
to
‘confront
the
politics
of
knowledge’,
the
ideal
of
value
neutral
scientific
expertise
stubbornly
persists
in
Western
democracies.17
This
is
perhaps
not
surprising,
given
that
the
ideal
itself
is
deeply
grounded
in
the
modernist
project.
From
the
sixteenth
to
the
nineteenth
centuries,
our
social
and
political
processes
were
moulded
by
the
institutionalization
of
what
Max
Weber
identified
as
the
application
of
reason
and
instrumental
rationality
to
everyday
society
by
way
of
the
scientific
method.
The
very
functioning
of
democratic
forms
of
governance
was
justified
upon
the
use
of
this
‘higher’
form
of
knowledge.18
Yet
as
science
shifted
out
of
the
private
sphere
and
into
the
public
and
institutional
during
the
nineteenth-­‐century,
the
professionalization
and
standardization
of
scientific
practice
led
to
a
necessary
restriction
of
access
to
knowledge
generation.
The
‘scientist’
progressively
moved
away
from
the
Enlightenment
ideal
of
the
‘cultivated
scholar’,
and
towards
the
emerging
specialized
expert.19
With
forms
of
knowing
grounded
in
scientific
method
already
privileged
over
all
other
forms,
this
process
created
an
implicit
elitism
within
supposedly
democratic
systems.20
As
access
to
expertise
receded
further
with
the
emergence
of
formalized
communication
systems
and
the
use
of
esoteric
language,
claims
to
objectivity
and
neutrality
allowed
experts
a
certain
level
of
cultural
and
social
authority.21
This
process
above
all
ran
16
Jean-­‐Jacques
Salomon,
‘Science,
Technology
and
Democracy,’
Minerva,
Vol.
38,
2000,
p.
37.
17
Robert
Proctor,
Value-­‐free
Science?:
Purity
and
Power
in
Modern
Knowledge,
Cambridge,
Harvard
University
Press,
1991,
p.
267.
18
Fischer,
Technocracy
and
the
Politics
of
Expertise,
pp.
61-­‐63.
19
Proctor,
Value-­‐free
Science?,
p.
264.
20
Indeed,
the
outward
commitment
to
universal
education
did
little
to
the
growth
of
elitism,
as
increased
specialization
dimmed
the
utopian
dream
of
a
fully
informed
polity.
Macleod,
‘Science
and
Democracy’,
pp.
372-­‐374.
21
Of
course,
boundaries
of
this
kind
are
constructed
partly
to
secure
scientific
knowledge
against
degradation
by
inferior
forms,
but
also
to
secure
authority
in
the
wider
social
realm,
legitimating
claims
to
it
within
the
system.
Julia
Evetts,
‘Professionalization,
Scientific
Expertise,
and
Elitism:
A
Sociological
Perspective,’
in
Neil
Charness
et
al.
(eds.),
The
Cambridge
Handbook
of
Expertise
and
Expert
Performance,
Cambridge,
Cambridge
University
Press,
2006,
p.
115.
4

5. counter
to
the
democratic
ideals
of
inclusion
and
equal
rights,
narrowing
the
scope
for
public
participation,
and
undermining
the
democratic
governance
scientific
knowledge
was
presumed
to
maintain.
Despite
this
apparent
conflict
between
scientific
expertise
and
democracy,
the
former’s
institutionalization
within
decision-­‐making
grew
exponentially
during
the
twentieth-­‐century.
Partly
this
can
be
seen
as
a
reaction
to
the
ostensible
success
of
applied
science
during
the
destruction
of
World
War
I
and
II,
which
seemed
to
show
that
democracy
without
science
is
both
‘inefficient
and
vulnerable’
in
the
face
of
encroachment
by
aggressive
authoritarianism.22
Of
no
less
importance,
however,
was
the
desire
to
usurp
the
influence
of
patronage
politics;
through
the
use
of
disinterested
policies
based
upon
scientific
method
and
rationality
such
political
expediency
would
be
undermined.
The
emergence
of
‘think
tanks’
and
their
ever-­‐increasing
influence
within
policy
formulation
is
indicative
of
this
trend
towards
the
‘scientization’
of
politics.23
Nico
Stehr
argues
that
the
growth
of
expert
influence
in
political
systems,
and
the
‘scientization’
of
politics,
can
be
seen
as
part
of
the
emergence
of
the
‘knowledge
society’.
Manifested
in
the
penetration
of
scientific
and
technical
understanding
into
the
core
of
the
economy,
social
action,
and
politics
itself,
this
‘post-­‐industrial
society’
ascribes
value
and
power
to
the
guardianship
of
knowledge.24
As
a
result
of
this
shift
from
material
to
information
value,
the
old
interest-­‐based
politics
is
replaced
by
governance
systems
directed
towards
the
22
Macleod,
‘Science
and
Democracy’,
pp.
375-­‐377.
23
Arguably
though,
policy
choice
is
no
clearer
than
before,
largely
due
to
the
plethora
of
(often
contradictory)
studies
advocating
every
position
on
every
conceivable
issue,
all
backed
by
scientific
expertise.
Andrew
M.
Rich,
Think
Tanks,
Public
Policy,
and
the
Politics
of
Expertise,
Cambridge,
Cambridge
University
Press,
2004,
pp.
2-­‐4.
The
public,
moreover,
has
rightly
come
to
view
think
tanks
as
bastions
of
ideology
rather
than
disinterested
fact,
a
belief
that
seriously
undermines
trust
in
their
‘expert’
advice
amongst
lay
audiences.
Ibid,
pp.
25-­‐6.
24
Nico
Stehr,
Knowledge
Societies,
London,
SAGE
Publications,
1994,
pp.
1-­‐15.
This
is
not
to
say,
however,
that
experts
can
be
thought
of
as
a
social
class,
being
merely
members
of
loose
associations.
Indeed,
while
they
have
power
in
the
elite
institutions
that
generate
knowledge,
they
have
only
influence
outside
of
them.
Ibid,
pp.
167-­‐168.
5

6. identification
of
social
policy
‘problems’,
with
feasibility
studies
and
apolitical
decision-­‐making
determining
the
scope
of
policy
choice.
Little
room
is
left
for
public
opinion
and
citizen
participation,
both
of
which
are
viewed
as
inferior,
even
irrational,
forms
of
policy
input.25
There
has
certainly
been
an
identifiable
shift
towards
‘scientific’
decision-­‐
making
in
Western
democracies
over
the
course
of
the
last
century.
Responding
to
concerns
that
policymaking
is
being
negatively
affected
by
the
vagaries
of
an
irrational
political
process,
political
and
administrative
leaders
have
progressively
institutionalized
technocracies
in
supposedly
democratic
countries.26
Following
Frank
Fisher,
this
system
of
governance
can
be
defined
as
one
in
which
‘technically
trained
experts
rule
by
virtue
of
their
specialized
knowledge
and
position
in
dominant
political
and
economic
institutions’.27
As
Jürgen
Habermas
has
argued
elsewhere,
this
reduction
of
political
power
into
rational
administration
can
occur
only
at
the
expense
of
democracy
itself.28
For
not
only
are
the
public
excluded
from
decision-­‐making,
but
the
traditional
role
of
their
political
representatives
in
democratic
systems
is
given
over
to
‘administratively
based
cadres
of
policy
experts’,
who
determine
the
direction
of
economic
and
social
policy.29
At
the
same
time
we
have
become
reliant
on
scientific
expertise.
For
despite
growing
evidence
of
lay
disenchantment
with
the
functioning
of
expertise
in
democratic
governance,
society
must
still
defer
to
expert
authority
on
issues
ranging
from
the
mundane
to
the
infinitely
complex.30
As
Dietrich
Rueschemeyer
argues
in
relation
to
experts:
25
Fischer,
Technocracy
and
the
Politics
of
Expertise,
pp.
15-­‐16.
26
Ibid,
p.
21.
27
Ibid,
p.
17.
28
Jürgen
Habermas,
Toward
a
Rational
Society:
Student
Protest,
Science,
and
Politics,
London,
Heinemann
Educational,
1971,
p.
68.
29
Fischer,
Technocracy
and
the
Politics
of
Expertise,
pp.
18-­‐19.
30
Stehr,
Knowledge
Societies,
pp.
163-­‐165.
6

7. [T]hey
define
the
situation
for
the
untutored,
they
suggest
priorities,
they
shape
people’s
outlook
on
their
life
and
world,
and
they
establish
standards
of
judgement
in
the
different
areas
of
expertise.31
Simply
put,
experts
are
those
adjudged
the
most
competent
in
answering
questions
related
to
their
specific
area
of
expertise.
Non-­‐experts,
or
the
lay
public,
are
at
best
unqualified
and
external
reviewers
ensuring
that
only
other
experts
in
their
field
can
truly
judge
the
adequacy
of
advice,
thereby
insulating
them
from
radical
external
criticism
of
their
results.32
Knowledge
becomes
the
domain
of
the
elite,
and
one
in
which
the
general
public
is
excluded.
This
presents
a
further
problem
for
democracy,
when
defined
as
‘government
by
discussion’,
because
the
discussion
itself
is
unintelligible
and
out
of
reach
for
the
majority.33
Here
we
can
find
Robert
Dahl’s
conception
of
the
democratic
ideal
useful
in
better
understanding
the
significance
of
this
problem.
Dahl
defines
the
ideal
democracy
as
one
that
ensures
the
equal
empowerment
of
all,
meaning
that
even
if
not
directly
participating
in
all
decisions,
no
citizen
should
be
specifically
excluded
from
doing
so.
As
the
above
discussion
indicates,
however,
modern
democracies
are
far
removed
from
this
ideal,
as
the
elite
controls
access
to
forms
of
knowledge
used
in
decision-­‐making.
Recognising
this,
Dahl
suggests
a
continuum
of
polyarchy34
based
on
levels
of
democratic
involvement
and
popular
sovereignty.
At
the
lower
end
of
this
continuum
are
those
countries
in
which
the
minimum
of
free
and
fair
elections
is
achieved,
but
where
the
elite
allows
for
little
public
involvement.
At
the
upper
end
is
a
governance
structure
within
which
each
citizen
is
equally
involved
in
the
defining
of
policy
agendas,
and
where
policy
is
created
transparently,
originates
from
numerous
sources,
and
public
deliberation
in
decision-­‐making
is
promoted.
Standing
between
the
lower
and
upper
levels
on
this
continuum
is
the
control
of
information
by
policy
31
Quoted
in
ibid,
p.
166.
32
Sassower,
Knowledge
without
Expertise,
pp.
64-­‐66.
33
Stephen
P.
Turner,
Liberal
Democracy
3.0:
Civil
Society
in
an
Age
of
Experts,
London,
SAGE
Publications,
2003,
pp.
5-­‐6.
34
Meaning
a
governance
system
in
which
power
is
vested
in
many
actors.
7

8. elites.35
Thus
Dahl
would
argue
that
expertise,
as
an
elite
bastion
of
knowledge,
lowers
the
level
of
democracy
in
those
countries
in
which
it
forms
the
basis
of
decision-­‐making.
The
Risk
Society
At
the
same
time
as
expertise
has
come
to
undermine
the
legitimate
functioning
of
democratic
governance,
a
crisis
in
confidence
has
beset
the
very
authority
of
that
expertise.
For
Ülrich
Beck,
the
sources
of
this
crisis
are
related
to
what
he
terms
the
‘risk
society’.
Whereas
during
modernity,
the
belief
in
progress,
truth,
and
the
purity
of
the
scientific
method
dominated,
our
‘post-­‐
industrial’
society
is
beset
by
doubt
and
anxieties
related
to
environmental
threats.
As
a
result,
uncertainty
and
risk
have
become
central
to
politics,
not
necessarily
due
to
the
discovery
of
new
threats
such
as
global
warming,
but
to
the
recently
developed
understandings
of
the
inherent
limitations
of
science.
Once
thought
of
as
a
vehicle
through
which
domination
of
nature
could
be
achieved,
we
now
distrust
science’s
ability
to
solve
the
problems
that
domination
has
produced.36
On
the
other
hand,
for
Beck,
‘[t]he
exposure
of
scientific
uncertainty
is
the
liberation
of
politics,
law
and
the
public
sphere
from
their
patronization
by
technocracy’.37
Yet
these
threats,
especially
global
warming,
still
necessitate
by
their
very
nature
a
dependence
upon
expertise
at
the
very
time
of
this
questioning.38
For
expert
bodies,
such
as
the
International
Panel
on
Climate
Change
(IPCC),
are
not
only
intimately
involved
in
the
construction
of
public
perceptions
of
risk,
but
also
in
our
response
to
them,
given
that
the
prevailing
approach
to
decision-­‐making
is
bound
up
in
modernity.39
Indeed,
as
35
W.
Lance
Bennett
and
Robert
M.
Entman
(eds.),
Mediated
Politics:
Communication
in
the
Future
of
Democracy,
New
York,
Cambridge
University
Press,
2001,
pp.
468-­‐469.
36
Irwin,
Citizen
Science,
pp.
45-­‐46.
37
Quoted
in
ibid,
p.
60.
38
Ülrich
Beck,
Ecological
Politics
in
an
Age
of
Risk,
Cambridge,
Polity
Press,
1995,
p.
161.
39
Geert
Munnichs,
‘Whom
to
Trust?:
Public
Concerns,
Late
Modern
Risks,
and
Expert
Trustworthiness,’
Journal
of
Agricultural
and
Environmental
Ethics,
Vol.
17,
No.
2,
2004,
p.
114.
8

9. Beck
himself
points
out,
the
answer
of
industrial
society
to
the
challenge
of
risk
is
to
intensify
technocratic
solutions.40
Arguably
then,
what
is
required
is
the
democratization
of
expertise
itself.
Moves
towards
the
inclusion
of
lay
understandings
of
risk
issues,
with
a
view
to
incorporating
them
within
decision-­‐making
processes,
have
in
fact
begun.41
The
House
of
Lords
in
Britain,
for
instance,
called
for
enhanced
public
involvement
in
scientific
matters
in
2000,
and
the
European
Commission
committed
itself
in
2001
to
‘sustained
dialogue
between
experts,
public
and
policy
makers’.
In
Scandinavia,
moreover,
the
success
of
expert-­‐citizen
dialogue
models,
pioneered
by
the
Danish
Board
of
Technology,
have
led
to
calls
for
their
adaptation
in
other
Western
democracies.
These
consensus
conferences
between
expert
and
lay
panels
provide
a
platform
for
the
questioning
of
expert
pronouncements
on
both
cognitive
and
normative
grounds.42
Experts
are
thus
forced
to
justify
their
assumptions
as
lay
audiences
search
for
value
judgements
and
the
infiltration
of
special
interests
into
knowledge
generation.
Such
conferences
are
particularly
useful
in
the
context
of
uncertainty
and
controversy,
as
prior
contestation
enhances
the
legitimacy
of
democratic
decisions.43
These
initiatives
are
therefore
gaining
credence
within
public
policy
discourse,
as
they
are
regarded
as
a
means
of
addressing
‘a
number
of
perceived
sources
of
potential
crisis
in
contemporary
governance;
namely
deficits
of
knowledge,
trust,
and
legitimacy’.44
40
Beck,
Ecological
Politics,
pp.
166-­‐167
41
Tom
Horlick-­‐Jones
et
al.,
‘Citizen
Engagement
Processes
as
Information
Systems:
The
Role
of
Knowledge
and
the
Concept
of
Translation
Quality,
Public
Understandings
of
Science,
Vol.
16,
2007,
p.
260.
42
Anders
Blok,
‘Experts
on
Public
Trial:
On
Democratizing
Expertise
Through
a
Danish
Consensus
Conference’,
Public
Understandings
of
Science,
Vol.
16,
2007,
pp.
163-­‐164.
43
Ibid,
p.
176.
44
Horlick-­‐Jones
et
al.,
‘Citizen
Engagement’,
p.
259.
9

10. Epistemic
Communities
and
Climate
Consensus
Given
these
deficits
in
trust
and
legitimacy,
how
can
the
expert
consensus
on
climate
change
and
its
authority
in
decision-­‐making,
be
explained?45
Peter
Haas
developed
the
notion
of
epistemic
communities
as
a
way
of
understanding
how
such
bodies
gain
authority
through
consensus
building
surrounding
their
specific
knowledge.
Following
Adler,
such
communities
can
be
defined
as:
a
network
of
individuals
or
groups
with
an
authoritative
claim
to
policy-­‐
relevant
knowledge
within
their
domain
of
expertise…They
adhere
to
the
following:
(1)
shared
consummatory
values
and
principled
beliefs;
(2)
shared
causal
beliefs
or
professional
judgement;
(3)
common
notions
of
validity
based
on
intersujective
internally
defined
criteria
for
validating
knowledge;
and
(4)
a
common
policy
project.46
Once
consensus
has
been
achieved,
and
epistemic
communities
formed
around
it,
its
members
implant
themselves
within
state
and
international
bureaucracies
in
order
to
affect
policy
decisions.
They
are
thus
well
positioned
to
define
the
content
of
policy
problems,
prescribe
solutions,
and
ultimately
assess
policy
outcomes.47
In
the
case
of
global
warming,
such
a
community
could
arguably
be
located
within
the
body
of
the
IPCC.48
Following
the
above
criteria,
the
IPCC,
45
Those
subscribing
to
the
expert
consensus
believe
that
we
know
‘beyond
reasonable
doubt
that
the
world
is
warming
and
that
human
emissions
of
greenhouse
gases
are
the
primary
cause’.
Climate
Commission,
The
Critical
Decade:
Climate
Science,
Risks
and
Responses,
Canberra,
Climate
Commission
Secretariat,
2011,
p.
60,
retrieved
19
June
2011,
available
from
<http://climatecommission.gov.au/topics/the-­‐critical-­‐decade/>.
46
Quoted
in
Matthew
Paterson,
Global
Warming
and
Global
Politics,
New
York,
Routledge,
1996,
p.
135.
47
See
Peter
M.
Haas,
‘Introduction:
Epistemic
Communities
and
International
Policy
Coordination,’
International
Organization,
Vol.
46,
No.
1,
1992,
pp.
1-­‐35.
48
Many
members
of
the
IPCC
have
been
involved
in
climate
research
since
the
1970s,
and
involved
in
expert
bodies
such
as
the
World
Meteorological
Organization
(WMO)
and
the
United
Nations
Environment
Programme
(UNEP),
10

11. through
its
four
year
reporting
structure,
periodically
publishes
shared
principled
belief
statements,
despite
regular
admissions
of
uncertainty,49
along
with
casual
judgements
related
to
the
role
of
carbon
dioxide
in
global
warming;50
it
shares
agreed
mechanisms
for
testing
in
the
form
of
climate
modelling;51
and
it
shares
a
common
policy
response
to
the
problem
–
the
drastic
reduction
of
greenhouse
gas
emissions.52
The
IPCC
and
its
predecessors,
moreover,
were
vital
to
the
emergence
of
global
warming
as
an
area
of
significant
policy
concern,
and
to
the
fostering
of
consensus
on
its
nature.53
Yet
it
is
not
clear
that
epistemic
community
frameworks
are
sufficient
to
deal
with
global
warming
for
two
reasons.
Firstly,
the
level
of
consensus
on
the
relationship
between
human
activity
and
warming
is
not
absolute,
with
multiple
communities
claiming
true
knowledge.
The
epistemic
community
approach,
however,
takes
scientific
consensus
as
the
precursor
to
policy
influence,
when
it
is
in
fact
far
more
complex
than
such
a
linear
relationship.54
Consensus,
based
here
upon
a
generally
agreed
set
of
possible
outcomes
rather
than
a
single
and
exact
prediction,
is
reached
through
the
interplay
of
assertion
and
disagreement
both
between
experts,
and
between
experts
and
policymakers.
During
this
process
the
content
of
consensus
can
be
altered
significantly
based
upon
value
as
well
as
the
First
Climate
Change
Conference
and
the
International
Council
of
Scientists.
Paterson,
Global
Warming,
p.
140.
49
In
the
IPCC’s
most
recent
assessment
report,
global
warming
was
described
as
‘unequivocal’,
and
its
human
sources
as
‘very
likely’,
despite
uncertainties
in
the
accuracy
of
data
and
the
projections
based
upon
it.
International
Panel
on
Climate
Change,
IPCC
Fourth
Assessment
Report:
Climate
Change
2007:
Synthesis
Report,
Cambridge,
Cambridge
University
Press,
2007,
p.
72,
retrieved
19
June
2011,
available
from
<
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/syr/en/
contents.html>.
It
is
important
to
recognize,
however,
that
the
uncertainty
described,
and
indicated
by
the
phrase
‘very
likely’,
refers
to
a
90
percent
probability.
Ibid,
p.
27.
50
Ibid,
p.
72.
51
See,
for
example,
ibid,
p.
51-­‐59.
52
Ibid,
p.
60.
53
Paterson,
Global
Warming,
pp.
140-­‐144.
See
ibid,
pp.
144-­‐147,
for
the
evolution
of
the
global
warming
agenda
from
the
1970s
to
the
mid-­‐1990s.
54
Paul
N.
Edwards
and
Clark
A.
Miller,
‘Introduction:
The
Globalization
of
Climate
Science
and
Climate
Politics,’
in
Paul
N.
Edwards
and
Clark
A.
Miller
(eds.),
Changing
the
Atmosphere:
Expert
Knowledge
and
Environmental
Governance,
Cambridge,
MIT
Press,
2001,
p.
4.
11

12. judgements
by
actors
external
to
the
epistemic
community,
and
related
to
risk
and
available
resources.55
Secondly,
as
Karen
Liftin
has
argued,
the
approach
tends
to
disregard
the
links
between
science
and
politics,
downplaying
‘the
ways
in
which
scientific
information
simply
rationalizes
or
reinforces
existing
political
conflicts.56
Indeed,
issues
such
as
global
warming
are
controversial
inasmuch
as
they
involve
‘ongoing
conflicts
over
basic
values
and
interest.’57
Thus,
different
actors,
each
seeking
particular
policy
goals,
have
manipulated
scientific
expertise
with
their
own
values
and
interests
in
mind
through
the
primary
communication
channel
for
the
lay
public
in
regards
to
global
warming
–
the
media.58
In
the
case
of
global
warming
these
ongoing
political
conflicts
involve
significant
implications
of
a
foundational
nature.
On
the
one
hand,
the
possibility
of
ecological
catastrophe
resulting
from
current
modes
of
human
activity
implies
a
crisis
of
industrial
society
itself,
and
thus
demands
self-­‐reflection
on
its
very
foundations.59
Conflict
here
is
not
being
fought
over
the
spoils
of
profit
and
prosperity,
but
the
allocation
of
negatives,
threats
and
possible
devastation.60
On
the
other
hand,
the
global
warming
debate
has
become
a
space
for
the
possible
reconfiguration
of
the
global
order,
with
institutions
created
on
a
worldwide
scale
to
tackle
it
becoming
sites
of
contestation
over
norms
and
practice.61
Despite
the
importance
of
these
conflicts,
the
debate
is
framed
within
the
Western
media
in
terms
of
science,
rather
than
as
an
investigation
into
the
social
and
cultural
dimensions
of
the
risk
itself.62
55
Paul
N.
Edwards
and
Stephen
H.
Schneider,
‘Self-­‐Governance
and
Peer
Review
in
Science-­‐for-­‐policy:
The
Case
of
the
IPCC
Second
Assessment
Report,’
in
Paul
N.
Edwards
and
Clark
A.
Miller
(eds.),
Changing
the
Atmosphere:
Expert
Knowledge
and
Environmental
Governance,
Cambridge,
MIT
Press,
2001,
pp.
244-­‐245
56
Quoted
in
Paterson,
Global
Warming,
p.
150.
57
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy,
pp.
2-­‐3.
58
Alison
Anderson,
Media,
Culture
and
the
Environment,
London,
UCL
Press,
1997,
pp.
107-­‐115.
59
Ülrich
Beck
et
al.,
Reflexive
Modernization:
Politics,
Tradition
and
Aesthetics
in
the
Modern
Social
Order,
Cambridge,
Polity
Press,
1994,
p.
8.
60
Ülrich
Beck,
Ecological
Enlightenment:
Essays
on
the
Politics
of
the
Risk
Society,
Atlantic
Highlands,
Humanities
Press,
1995,
p.
3.
61
Edwards
and
Miller,
‘Introduction’,
pp.
2-­‐4.
62
Irwin,
Citizen
Science,
p.
37.
12

13. Indeed,
contestation
in
this
debate
has
generally
taken
place
on
the
nature
of
the
consensus
itself.
For
instance,
the
IPCC’s
Second
Assessment
Report
of
1996,
in
its
eight
chapter,
concluded
that
‘the
balance
of
evidence
suggests
that
there
is
a
discernible
human
influence
on
global
climate’.
Immediately,
however,
these
claims
were
contested,
especially
on
the
basis
that
human
activity
was
the
root
cause.
Led
by
the
eminent
physicist
Frederick
Seitz,
those
dissenting
claimed
that
the
peer
review
process
had
been
compromised
for
political
reasons,
claims
that
ignited
a
debate
widely
reported
in
the
media.63
Unproven
claims
such
as
Seitz’s
gain
credence
in
the
public
sphere,
and
undermine
trust
in
bodies
such
as
the
IPCC,
regardless
of
the
fact
that
IPCC
publications
are
peer-­‐reviewed
by
hundreds
of
experts
prior
to
release,
a
process
explained
by
the
overrepresentation
of
marginal
views
in
the
media,64
and
by
the
nature
of
climate
science
itself.65
Unfortunately,
due
to
their
technical
63
Seitz’s
complaints
were
based
on
the
conclusions
contained
in
chapter
eight,
which
he
claimed
had
been
altered
following
the
November
1995
plenary
meeting
of
IPCC
Working
Group
I.
At
this
meeting,
Seitz
claimed,
the
text
of
that
chapter
had
been
agreed
too,
and
the
subsequent
deletion
of
passages
that
indicated
uncertainty
amounted
to
the
corruption
of
peer
review
for
political
ends.
Not
surprisingly
the
IPCC
Secretariat,
who
pointed
to
peer
review
process
undertaken
following
alterations
to
the
text,
dismissed
these
claims.
Edwards
and
Schneider,
‘Self-­‐Governance
and
Peer
Review’,
p.
219.
64
In
Australia,
for
example,
research
has
shown
that
the
media
is
the
main
source
of
information
on
climate
change,
and
the
main
factor
shaping
people’s
awareness
of
it,
especially
as
regards
uncertainty.
Desley
L.
Speck,
‘A
Hot
Topic?
Climate
Change
Mitigation
Policies,
Politics,
and
the
Media
in
Australia,’
Human
Ecology
Review,
Vol.
17,
No.
2,
2010,
p.
125.
For
examples
of
the
publication
of
marginal
views
in
the
media
in
Australia,
see
Jo
Chandler,
‘When
Science
is
Undone
by
Fiction’,
The
Age,
June
29
2011,
retrieved
29
June
2011,
available
from
<http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/when-­‐science-­‐is-­‐undone-­‐by-­‐
fiction-­‐20110628-­‐1gp26.html>;
and
John
Cook,
‘Half
the
Truth
on
Emissions’,
The
Age,
June
28
2011,
retrieved
29
June
2011,
available
from
<http://www.theage.
com.au/opinion/society-­‐and-­‐culture/half-­‐the-­‐truth-­‐on-­‐
emissions-­‐20110627-­‐1gne1.html>.
65
Climate
science
is
based
upon
modelling
using
‘semi-­‐empirical
and
heuristic
principles
derived
from
observation’.
These
observations
suffer
from
problems
of
scale
and
availability,
leading
to
inaccurate,
incomplete,
inconsistent
and
temporally
brief
regional
data
sets,
which
are
then
globalized
through
interpolating
and
correcting.
Paul
N.
Edwards,
‘Representing
the
Global
Atmosphere:
Computer
Models,
Data,
and
Knowledge
about
Climate
Change’,
in
P.
N.
Edwards
and
C.
A.
Miller
(eds.),
Changing
the
Atmosphere:
Expert
Knowledge
and
Environmental
Governance,
Cambridge,
MIT
Press,
2001,
pp.
62-­‐63.
For
a
13

14. nature,
the
facts
and
data
on
global
warming
do
not
speak
for
themselves,
and
have
to
be
interpreted
and
acted
upon
based
on
expert
advice.66
As
Professor
Ross
Garnaut
has
claimed,
‘the
outsider
to
climate
science
has
no
rational
choice
but
to
accept
that,
on
a
balance
of
probabilities,
the
mainstream
science
is
right
in
pointing
to
high
risks
from
unmitigated
climate
change’.67
Regardless
of
this
dependence,
sceptics
can
‘cherry-­‐pick’
details
and
claim
them
as
contrary
to
the
overall
consensus,
thereby
undermining
confidence.68
‘Climategate’
The
effects
of
contestation
over
the
global
warming
‘consensus’
are
best
illustrated
by
the
so-­‐called
‘climategate’
scandal.
On
20
November
2009
hacked
emails,
sent
over
a
15-­‐year
period,
and
originating
from
the
Climate
Research
Unit
(CRU)69
of
the
University
of
East
Anglia,
were
released
publically
on
the
website
realclimate.org.
The
emails,
it
was
claimed,
showed
evidence
of
data
suppression
and
manipulation,
as
well
as
intimidation
of
scientific
journal
editors
in
order
to
prevent
the
publication
of
contrary
opinions,
all
as
part
of
an
effort
to
manufacture
consensus
on
climate
change.70
The
supposed
uncovering
of
such
activity
amounted
to
what
one
climate
change
sceptic,
Christopher
Brooks
of
The
Telegraph,
called
the
‘worst
scientific
scandal
of
our
generation’.71
good
typology
of
climate
modeling
and
data
collection
see
ibid,
pp.
35-­‐49;
for
a
detailed
overview
of
specific
modeling
methods
see
ibid,
pp.
55-­‐62.
66
Ibid,
pp.
32-­‐33.
67
Ross
Garnaut,
The
Garnaut
Climate
Change
Review:
Final
Report,
Port
Melbourne,
Cambridge
University
Press,
2008,
p.
xcii.
68
Irwin,
Citizen
Science,
pp.
67-­‐68.
See
for
example,
Cook,
‘Half
the
Truth
on
Emissions’.
69
The
CRU
is
one
of
the
most
influential
scientific
institutions
in
the
field
of
climate
change,
heavily
involved
in
the
collection
of
datasets
and
climate
modelling
used
in
the
IPCC’s
assessment
reports.
Brigitte
Nerlich,
‘"Climategate":
Paradoxical
Metaphors
and
Political
Paralysis,’
Environmental
Values,
Vol.
19,
2010,
pp.
421-­‐422.
70
For
an
example
of
such
claims
see
George
H.
Avery,
‘Scientific
Misconduct:
The
Perversion
of
Scientific
Evidence
for
Public
Advocacy’,
World
Medical
&
Health
Policy,
Vol.
2,
No.
4,
2010,
p.
20.
71
Christopher
Booker,
‘Climate
Change:
This
is
the
Worst
Scientific
Scandal
of
our
Generation’,
The
Telegraph,
28
November
2009,
retrieved
19
June
2011
available
from
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/
14

15. Conservative
bloggers,
moreover,
framed
the
‘scandal’
as
evidence
of
a
climate
change
‘scam’,
and
the
scientific
advice
behind
the
consensus
as
untrustworthy.72
Three
independent
panels
would
later
conclude
that
there
was
in
fact
no
evidence
of
misconduct
on
the
part
of
the
scientists.
Yet
media
publicity
surrounding
the
issue
ensured
the
damage
had
been
done.73
Analysis
of
the
emails
themselves
was
never
more
than
perfunctory,
allowing
the
‘cherry-­‐
picking’
of
seemingly
incriminating
details
to
supress
the
full
story.
By
the
time
of
the
release
of
the
panels’
findings,
the
reputations
of
the
experts
involved
had
already
been
tarnished
and
have
since
struggled
to
recover.74
Brigitte
Nerlich,
who
has
studied
the
reaction
to
the
release
of
the
emails
found
that
even
its
framing
as
‘climategate’,
with
negative
connotations
of
the
Watergate
scandal
and
political
cover
up,
resonated
‘with
popular
imagination
and
cultural
knowledge’.
This
process
opened
‘up
a
whole
narrative
space
or
frame’
which
allowed
‘people
to
easily
structure
their
arguments
about
a
controversial
topic’.75
Indeed,
regardless
of
the
veracity
of
the
claims,
the
scandal
certainly
served
to
undermine
the
public’s
trust
in
climate
science.
For
example,
in
the
aftermath
of
the
release
of
the
emails,
and
the
failure
of
the
Copenhagen
negotiations
on
global
responses
to
climate
change,
a
British
study
revealed
that
‘the
proportion
of
adults
who
believe
climate
change
is
“definitely”
a
reality
dropped
by
30%
over
the
last
year,
from
44%
to
31%.’76
The
public
outrage
that
christopherbooker/6679082/Climate-­‐change-­‐this-­‐is-­‐the-­‐worst-­‐scientific-­‐
scandal-­‐of-­‐our-­‐generation.html>.
72
Brigitte
Nerlich,
‘"Climategate”’,
pp.
421-­‐422.
73
Richard
Fielding,
‘The
Perversion
of
Scientific
Evidence
for
Policy
Advocacy:
A
Perspective
on
Avery
2010’,
World
Medical
&
Health
Policy,
Vol.
3,
No.
1,
2011,
p.
2.
For
an
example
of
one
of
the
panels
findings
see
74
Fred
Pearce,
‘How
the
“Climategate”
Scandal
is
Bogus
and
Based
on
Climate
Sceptics’
Lies’,
The
Guardian,
2
February
2010,
p.
7,
retrieved
19
June
2011,
available
from
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/01/
climate-­‐emails-­‐sceptics>.
As
it
cannot
be
undertaken
here,
for
an
in
depth
analysis
of
the
content
of
the
emails,
and
the
phrases
that
led
people
to
believe
that
a
‘scam’
had
been
uncovered,
see
Celia
Deane-­‐Drummond,
‘A
Case
for
Collective
Conscience:
Climate
Gate,
COP-­‐15
and
Climate
Justice’,
Studies
in
Christian
Ethics,
Vol.
24,
No.
1,
2011,
p.
8-­‐10.
75
Nerlich,
‘”Climategate”’,
p.
423.
76
Juliette
Jowit,
‘Sharp
Decline
in
the
Public’s
Belief
in
Climate
Threat,
British
Poll
Reveals’,
The
Guardian,
24
February
2010,
p.
9,
retrieved
19
June
2011,
15

16. followed,
however
misplaced,
weakened
pressure
for
political
action
on
a
global
scale,
a
fact
highlighted
by
the
failure
of
Copenhagen,
and
fed
into
debates
over
the
legitimacy
of
scientific
expertise
in
democracies.77
Yet
‘Climategate’
did
bring
about
several
important
changes
in
the
conduct
of
climate
expertise.
Many
bodies
involved
in
data
collection
moved
towards
the
opening
up
of
datasets
to
public
scrutiny.
It
also
forced
experts
to
acknowledge
that
climate
change
policy
is
not
created
in
a
linear
relationship
between
science
and
decision-­‐making,
but
rather
includes
a
complex
set
of
value
and
interest
inputs
which
must
be
negotiated.78
Nonetheless,
critics
continue
to
claim
that
the
dependence
on
funding
streams,
linked
to
the
political
existence
of
the
threat,
creates
inherent
incentives
for
research
outcomes
to
support
the
significance
of
the
threat
of
global
warming.79
It
is
argued
that
the
consensus
is
garnered
through
the
framing
of
realities
consistent
with
the
scientists’
ethics
in
order
to
convince
the
public
of
their
preferred
policy
actions.
Expertise
here
moves
from
mere
observation
to
outright
advocacy.80
The
case
of
‘Climategate’
highlights
that
the
global
warming
‘consensus’
is
in
fact
contested
in
nature.
This
contestation
plays
upon
the
uncertain
nature
of
knowledge
on
this
issue
in
particular,
and
in
scientific
expertise
more
generally.
As
expert
authority
is
based
on
epistemological
certainty,
gathered
through
neutral
observation,
it
is
necessarily
diminished
as
a
result.81
The
established
position
of
the
IPCC
as
an
authority
on
climate
science
suffers
also
as
it
finds
itself
immersed
in
the
crisis
of
trust
and
expert
legitimacy
in
the
public
eye.
As
Garnaut
has
pointed
out,
it
is
‘public
attitudes
in
Australia
and
in
other
countries
available
from
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/23/british-­‐
public-­‐belief-­‐climate-­‐poll>.
77
Deane-­‐Drummond,
Studies
in
Christian
Ethics,
pp.
8-­‐9.
78
Mark
Hulme,
‘The
Year
Climate
Science
was
Redefined’,
The
Guardian,
16
November
2010,
retrieved
19
June
2011,
available
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/
environment/2010/nov/15/year-­‐climate-­‐science-­‐was-­‐redefined?INTCMP=
SRCH>.
79
Avery,
‘Scientific
Misconduct’,
p.
26.
80
Ibid,
pp.
19-­‐20.
81
Indeed,
Karl
Popper
convincingly
argued
the
view
that
without
certainty
expertise
holds
no
authority.
See
Sassower,
Knowledge
without
Expertise,
pp.
67.
16

17. [that]
create
the
possibility
of
major
reform…despite
the
inherent
difficulty
of
the
policy
problem’.82
Contestation
and
Democracy
In
order
both
to
democratize
expertise,
and
to
rescue
its
authority
in
decision-­‐making,
real
contestation
over
expert
advice
needs
to
take
place.
It
must
be
recognised
that
expert
knowledge
is
often
incomplete
or
uncertain,
especially
in
cases
such
as
global
warming,
whose
indeterminate
nature
ensures
that
no
single
and
unambiguous
answer
can
be
found.
This
fact
allows
interest
groups
to
exploit
lay
understandings
of
issues
through
the
use
of
counter-­‐
expertise,
rather
than
the
proper
evaluation
of
the
case
at
hand.83
Science
alone
cannot
provide
these
judgements,
as
its
normative
dimensions
relating
to
distribution
and
justice
is
a
concern
for
the
public
at
large,
and
necessitates
lay
involvement.84
Yet
it
is
debatable
whether
scientists
can
or
even
should
remove
themselves
from
normative
questions.
Arguments
for
them
to
do
so
are
rooted
in
the
belief
of
science
as
objective
representation,
a
hangover
from
modernity.
In
fact,
normative
statements
are
bound
up
in
expert
statements
and
advice,
and
hence
the
interpretation
of
results,
by
the
very
process
of
research
selection
and
design.85
What
is
required
then
is
contestation,
in
an
open
and
transparent
manner,
alongside
democratic
participation
by
lay
publics
so
that
trust
may
be
engendered.86
For
different
types
of
information,
lay
and
expert,
social
and
scientific,
serve
to
co-­‐construct
our
understanding
of
issues
such
as
global
warming.87
Each
must
be
examined
so
that
legitimacy
may
be
lent
to
the
decision-­‐making
process.
82
Garnaut,
‘The
Garnaut
Climate
Change
Review’,
p.
xix.
83
Brown,
Science
in
Democracy,
pp.
11-­‐12.
84
Turner,
Liberal
Democracy
3.0,
p.
4.
85
Munnichs,
‘Whom
to
Trust?’,
pp.
118-­‐119.
86
Ibid,
pp.
121-­‐124.
87
Jacquelin
Burgess
et
al.,
‘Global
Warming
in
the
Public
Sphere’,
p.
2767.
17

18.
Contestation
here
is
not
taken
to
mean
the
overrepresentation
of
countervailing
opinions
in
the
news
media.
Superficial
questioning
of
this
kind
does
not
result
in
a
more
informed
and
critically
aware
polity,
nor
does
it
add
to
the
content
of
expertise.
This
is
especially
the
case
when
governments
and
interest
groups
use
expertise
in
ways
that
serve
to
constrain
debate
on
the
strengths
and
weaknesses
of
scientific
knowledge.88
Nevertheless,
lay
participation,
though
seen
by
many
to
allow
irrational
responses
to
risk
issues,
can
lead
to
the
inclusion
of
wider
perspectives
perhaps
not
considered
by
technical
experts.89
Indeed,
scientific
knowledge,
while
valuable,
is
incomplete
especially
as
regards
issues
with
significant
normative
implications.
It
can
help
explain
if
and
why
a
relationship
exists,
but
is
not
in
a
position
to
answer
what
‘ought’
to
be
done
about
it
in
the
moral
and
ethical
sense,
which
is
the
domain
of
democratic
decision-­‐making.90
As
important
is
the
legitimacy
contestation
and
public
participation
lend
to
expert
advice
in
those
processes,
through
the
democratization
of
expertise
itself.
Public
participation,
which
is
not
aided
by
the
current
form
of
contestation
on
this
issue,
must
be
encouraged
if
democracy
and
expertise
are
to
be
amendable.
Conclusions
Science
and
its
institutions
are
in
a
sense
the
antithesis
of
democratic
systems
–
they
are
a
professionalized
elite
of
expertise,
closed
to
the
majority.91
Yet
expertise
in
democracies
only
encounters
problems
in
certain
situations.
Conflict
arises
in
cases
where
its
audience
is
public,
while
its
funding
private,
or
when
those
in
public
administration
accept
their
knowledge
as
authoritative.
Hence,
the
political
issue
for
democracies
is
not
the
existence
of
expertise,
but
88
Myanna
Lahsen,
‘Technocracy,
Democracy,
and
U.S.
Climate
Politics:
The
Need
for
Demarcations,’
Science,
Technology,
&
Human
Values,
Vol.
30,
No.
1,
2005,
pp.
138-­‐139.
89
Horlick-­‐Jones
et
al.,
‘Citizen
Engagement’,
p.
260.
90
Avery,
‘Scientific
Misconduct’,
p.
19.
91
Salomon,
‘Science,
Technology
and
Democracy’,
p.
33.
18

19. the
discretionary
use
of
it
in
the
public
sphere.92
When
opened
up
to
public
scrutiny
of
its
use
the
conflict
between
expertise
and
democracy
is
less
pronounced.
Indeed,
the
spirit
of
free
inquiry
upon
which
modern
science
is
based
is
itself
a
foundational
democratic
principal.
In
the
case
of
the
global
warming
debate,
two
effects
of
the
closed
nature
of
expertise
are
evident.
Firstly,
sceptics
find
debate
over
method
and
uncertainty
convenient
to
their
cause,
despite
their
marginal
nature.
Secondly,
the
media,
having
shifted
pseudo-­‐contestation
to
the
public
sphere,
helps
them
in
their
cause.93
As
a
consequence,
there
have
been
policy
failures
ranging
from
the
global,
such
as
the
Copenhagen
negotiations,
to
the
local,
such
as
the
Emissions
Trading
Scheme
(ETS)
in
Australia.94
The
reality
is
that
in
the
face
of
environmental
risks
such
as
global
warming,
we
are
dependent
upon
technical
expertise.
It
cannot
then
be
simply
eradicated
from
democracy.
In
order
to
democratize
expertise
and
conduct
real
evaluations
of
it,
contestation
in
decision-­‐making,
based
upon
lay
participation
and
inquiry,
needs
to
be
instituted
within
democratic
forms
of
governance.
92
Stephen
P.
Turner,
‘What
is
the
Problem
with
Experts?,’
Social
Studies
of
Science,
Vol.
31,
No.
1,
2001,
pp.
140-­‐141.
93
Burgess
et
al.,
‘Global
Warming
in
the
Public
Sphere’,
p.
2751.
94
Climate
change
policy
in
Australia
would
be
significantly
affected
particularly
following
the
failure
of
the
Copenhagen
negotiations.
After
two
defeats
in
the
Australian
Senate
for
the
ETS
the
government
of
the
Australian
Labour
Party
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that
it
would
not
seen
an
economy-­‐wide
market-­‐based
mitigation
program
until
after
2013.
Garnaut,
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if
Mainstream
Science
if
Right?,
p.
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